The Real Boy

by Anne Ursu

  Walking into the house felt like stepping into an enchantment. It was a completely different world, warmer than the real world ever was, and the air had texture and moisture and life. The flowers burst forth in colors no illustration in a book had ever been able to reproduce—they looked like birds, like bells, like butterflies. They made even the clothes of the shining people seem dull. Oscar always stepped quietly through the glass house, trying to make as little disturbance as he could. He was trespassing; this house belonged to the flowers.

  Oscar took a cart from the side of the glass house and began moving it through the gardens. He scanned the pantry shelves in his mind, making a list of jars that needed filling. He worked for two hours among the green and thriving things, picking plants, trimming off leaves and flowers, plucking berries, until his cart was full. He found Crow curled up near the raspberry bushes, as if to remind him not to forget the leaves.

  “It’s time to go,” Oscar whispered. “It will be dark soon.”

  Crow blinked up at him sleepily.

  Oscar sighed. “You’re not going to walk, are you?” The cat eyed him, as if that was a very stupid question. “All right,” Oscar said, picking Crow up in his arms and putting her in a corner of the cart. She crawled onto a pile of meadowsweet and immediately curled up again. “Well,” Oscar murmured, “those needed to be crushed anyway.”

  It was near dark when Oscar got home. He opened the back door of the shop carefully—maybe if the door moved slowly enough Wolf would not notice a thing. But Wolf was not there. Crow jumped out of the cart, and Oscar unloaded everything into the kitchen and crept back down to his pantry.

  As soon as his hands were working the mortar and pestle, everything else was gone. It was just his hands, the plants, the cool brass, the steady crushing and grinding, as soothing and steadfast as a cat’s purr.

  He made dough with anise and slippery-elm powder, picked off small pieces, and rolled them in his hands so they were the size of tiny pellets, small enough that people could swallow them. You had to roll them for a hundred counts, one at a time—one, two, three, four—all the way up to a hundred. Your hands became infused with the sharp, sweet smell, as if you yourself had absorbed some little bit of magic. He fed mugwort leaves into his small mill and turned the crank—fifty times, for mugwort, as fast as your hands could go, and faster still. He peeled white bark off pieces of birch and then smoothed out the wood so it was prepared for Caleb to carve charms. He cleaned and polished some of the strangely colored stones that had come in with the last boat shipments, until they were as shiny as they were smooth. He could not help but hold them in his palm for a moment when he was done, fold his hand around them, and squeeze—each one seemed like such a fixed, true thing.

  And soon it was time for Oscar to go into his room. It was one of the rules Caleb was strict about: Oscar must be in his room at nine and not come out again until morning.

  Oscar’s room—down the hallway from the main cellar—was just big enough to hold a narrow mattress, a little table for a lantern, a washbasin, and a small cabinet for Oscar’s things, of which there were not very many. Tonight, just like every night, a small orange kitten named Pebble lay on the bed, licking her paws. Oscar scratched her in between her two shoulder blades, washed up, and got into bed.

  One hour. Two. Pebble got up and began to pace. Three.

  After he heard everyone go to bed, and an hour after that, Oscar finally left his room, shushing a protesting Pebble. He moved whisper soft through the cellar hallway, passing by Caleb’s workshop on his way to the library like nothing more than a breath. These are the things you learn when you spend your days underground, when your body spends so much time in shadow you can’t always tell where you end and the shadow begins, when all your friends are cats.

  It was impossible that he could read. It was not the sort of thing they taught in the Children’s Home. Reading was for apprentices. Oscar wasn’t even supposed to be out of his room.

  But, somehow, he could read. And ever since he’d come to serve Caleb, he could not resist the library and the whole world of things in there.

  Without the books, Oscar would not know about the herbs, about their properties and powers—could never have combined passionflower and verbena to make something that looked like raspberry leaves and did not work like walnut leaves and could cause the greatest magician in the Barrow to wink at him and say, Not bad, my boy.

  It was worth a small disobedience.

  As long as he did not get caught.

  The library, like everything in Caleb’s underground complex, was impossibly large—the size of the entire footprint of the aboveground shop. All the walls were covered with shelves. It looked like a room made of books, with a floor and a ceiling attached for propriety’s sake. There was a desk tucked into one end and, next to that, a large red upholstered chair on which slept a skinny cat with black spots that spread across a base of shining white fur like islands on an ocean. His name was Map.

  So Oscar settled in the library as he did many nights, pulling out books while the cats slept on shelves. Since Caleb had started importing from beyond the boundaries of the island of Aletheia, there’d been much to learn. And more books to learn it from, too—Gardens of Babylon and The Bounty of the East. Oscar flipped through the pages, collecting images in his mind and filing them away.

  Suddenly he felt a nip at his ankles. The brown tomcat, Cat, was staring at him, thumping his tail.

  “What is it?” Oscar whispered.

  It was a noise in the hallway. Footsteps. Coming toward the library. Slowly.

  Oscar’s heart sped up. He leaned over and turned down his lantern. The footsteps stopped for a moment. Silence. Cat blinked. And then again—heading back toward the bedrooms.

  Oscar gulped. Caleb or Wolf?

  He sat in darkness in the library, counting to two hundred, his heart pounding like footsteps. He should not be here, should not be reading, should not be out of bed, should not do anything to jeopardize his place in Caleb’s house.

  He picked himself up and tiptoed back to his room.

  Once, Oscar had lived in the Children’s Home—across the plaguelands, across the river, on the eastern side of Aletheia where no magic lived. He did not remember much about the Home; whenever he tried to remember, his head filled with noise, some heavy pressing feeling, and flickering shadows that were the color of an old bruise. It was not a place he wanted to think too much about.

  Now he served the only true magician in the Barrow. He spent his days tucked safely in the quiet and dark, with his hands and the plants and the cocoon of the pantry and the steady company of cats. His days had been like this as far back as his memory chose to reach—and they would be like this as far forward as he could imagine.

  If it weren’t for Wolf, everything would be perfect.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Wolf’s Revenge

  Oscar awoke in the morning with the feeling of dread twitching in his body, as if mice had been skittering along the inside of his skin all night. With a deep breath, he counted the things around him that were real. There was the ceiling; there were his walls; here was his bed, his blanket, his Pebble.

  Whenever he woke up from a dream, he had to talk himself slowly back into this world, counting its structures and boundaries and steady, sure things. Whatever great gaping world his mind had taken him to the night before, the one he lived in was made of small closed-in spaces. It was all right. It was all right.

  He sat up in bed and Pebble brushed against his side. The structures and boundaries of the day laid themselves out before him, and he counted them: get the water; sweep the shop; go pick up the washing from Mister Albert (for it was Tuesday); go to the pantry; sort yesterday’s haul into things that needed to be dried, pressed, and pulped; dry, press, and pulp them; and go back to bed after nightfall.

  And try to avoid Wolf the best he could.

  Oscar got up and washed, then put on his white shirt and brown pants and black boots. T
he footsteps of the night before echoed in his head. But maybe it was nothing, he told himself. Maybe his secret was safe.

  His secret was not safe. When Oscar opened the door to his room, a small stack of books from the library waited for him in the hallway. Orphans: Boon or Bane? read one. Misfits and Madmen: Common Disorders of the Mind read another. The Plight of the Idiot read the last.

  Not Caleb’s footsteps, then.

  Checking carefully up and down the hallway, Oscar picked up the books and put them under his bed. “You can read these while I’m working,” he muttered to Pebble. If Oscar was lucky, Wolf would just decide to torment him rather than tell Caleb that Oscar had been in the library at night.

  It was a bad day when Wolf’s torment was the better choice.

  Oscar was sweeping the shop when Wolf strode in, wearing the red cloak and the small leaf pin that marked him as an apprentice. His face was split with a smile, the sort that said Wolf was about to enjoy himself and Oscar was not.

  “So you can read now?” Wolf said, his voice bouncing off the walls. “That’s marvelous! The idiot can do tricks!” He thumped the counter emphatically, making Oscar jump.

  Oscar’s eyes went to Wolf’s shoulder. “It’s not a trick,” he said through clenched teeth.

  “You think you can make me look bad in front of Master Caleb? You think you’re so special because he lets you grind herbs? That’s not real magic; that’s just plants. There’s a whole wide world outside of your little pantry.” Wolf leaned in and grinned. “He needs me for the important things.”

  Oscar’s grip around the broom tightened. “I do not think I’m so special,” he said. “I like plants.”

  “Oh, do you?” Wolf drew himself up, his thick eyebrows knotting together. “I’m the apprentice. I have magic. I was certified by the duke. Were you?’

  No, Oscar was not.

  “You think Caleb likes you. But you’re useful to him. That’s all. You would be smart not to forget it. Because when you stop being useful . . .” Wolf threw out his wide arms as if there were a world of possibilities of what might happen to Oscar when he stopped being useful to Caleb. At the moment Oscar could think of only two: back to the Children’s Home, or stepping out of the forest and falling into the void.

  “I am useful,” Oscar whispered. But whether for his benefit or for Wolf’s he wasn’t sure.

  Wolf let out a noise and then shook his head slowly. “You don’t even know where you came from,” Wolf said.

  Before Oscar could ask him what he was talking about, Caleb strode in from the back room, and in a blink of an eye Nice Wolf appeared.

  “Are we ready?” the apprentice asked.

  Caleb eyed him. “Ah. No,” he said, adjusting his gray cloak. “That is, I have urgent business to attend to on the continent. I will be gone for a couple of days.”

  Oscar swallowed. This happened sometimes: Caleb often locked himself in his workroom for a day, or all night. And more and more lately Caleb left altogether—sometimes for an afternoon or a day, sometimes for days. Wolf ran the shop and acted like he was the only true magician in the Barrow, and Oscar did his best to stay out of his way.

  But that worked best when Wolf wasn’t actively out to punish him.

  “I know you’ll both keep everything running smoothly,” Caleb added. He glanced at them and then nodded, as if that were all there was to be said.

  “But Master,” Wolf said after a moment, “I thought we had that . . . errand.”

  “Mmm?” Caleb blinked. “Oh, yes. We do. We’ll do it when I get back.”

  Wolf tilted his head. “If it’s important, I could do it on my own.”

  Caleb frowned. “That will not be necessary. We do not close the shop during marketplace hours.” He motioned to the framed piece of paper that hung next to the door—his license from the duke to sell magical goods to the Asterians. “You will run the shop, and Oscar will keep you in supplies.” Caleb looked from Wolf to Oscar. “I trust everything will be in order when I return.”

  Wolf glanced at Oscar and smiled so that only Oscar could see his fangs. “Certainly, Master Caleb,” he said. “You can count on us.”

  Oscar blinked. “It’s Tuesday,” he said. And then he slipped out the door to head to Mister Albert’s to get the washing.

  An hour later, Oscar was back in his pantry. It was the first time he’d ever wanted to stay in the marketplace for longer than he needed to. As much as he shrank from the noise and bustle, it was much better than whatever Wolf had in store for him.

  The shop would not open for another half hour, and Oscar could hear nothing from upstairs. Caleb was certainly gone already—the magician did not waste time—and Wolf was probably outside somewhere sharpening his claws.

  The only sound came from the white puffball in the corner—the very fluffy cat Bear, who made little grunting noises when she slept. The company was nice; Caleb’s complex felt eerily hollow when there were no people in it.

  And then—footsteps walking in the shop overhead. Two pairs: Wolf’s assertive footfalls followed by someone else’s lighter tread. Then, three big stomps right above him. The ceiling trembled, the glass jars shook, and Bear started awake with a cranky meow.

  Oscar was being summoned.

  He took a deep breath, rubbed his arm, and headed upstairs, trying to put some identity to the second pair of footsteps so he could prepare himself. His heart was pounding—whether out of fear of Wolf or fear of a stranger he wasn’t sure.

  And, indeed, there was a stranger: Wolf was standing near the front door next to a tall girl with straight black hair and angles for cheeks. She, too, wore a red cloak joined with an apprentice pin. Oscar felt himself shrink, as if he could disappear entirely.

  Wolf grinned at Oscar. “Hello, Oscar,” he said, drawing out the name like a purr. “This is Bonnie. She’s Master Robin’s new apprentice, just certified.” Master Robin was the Barrow guardian, and his former apprentice had had an unfortunate incident involving a warding spell and a tree.

  Oscar swallowed.

  “Why doesn’t he look at me?” the girl asked.

  “I’m sorry,” Wolf said. “The boy has no manners. He’s an orphan and he’s not quite right in the head. Caleb and I have taken him under our care.”

  Oscar gritted his teeth. “You have not—”

  “Anyway, Oscar,” Wolf interrupted, voice puffed out like a cloud, “something urgent has come up. Bonnie and I have very important business deep in the forest.”

  The new apprentice grinned and flipped her hair.

  “Now?” Oscar said.

  “Yes, now.” Wolf held up a hand. “With Caleb gone it is my job to act in the magician’s stead. I’m afraid we will be out all day.”

  Oscar’s breath caught. “You can’t close the shop! Master Caleb said—”

  “I know what Master Caleb said. We can’t close the shop.” Wolf waved an arm toward the shop’s license. “But I have very important business, you see. Magician business. So you’ll have to mind the shop.”

  “I’ll . . . what?”

  Wolf stretched a long arm out and put it around Oscar’s shoulder. “There’s nothing to fear, my lad. Remember how special you are? You can read; you can even grind up plants into tiny bits. I’m sure you’ll have no trouble running the shop for a day.”

  “But—”

  “And I’ll talk to the customers and tell Master Caleb all about how well you did.” Wolf’s bony hand squeezed Oscar’s shoulder. “Then he’ll see how capable you really are.”

  “You can’t—”

  Wolf squeezed his hand, tight enough to make Oscar yelp. “Have fun!” he said. And then in a swirl of cloaks the two apprentices were gone.

  Oscar stood. And stared. The red of the cloaks flashed behind his eyes. His gaze went from the shop license to the clock. His heart sped up.

  And then the front door opened.

  Oscar took a step back, gripping the counter tightly with one hand.

  A wo
man and a girl walked in, both dressed in loose white shirts, long brown skirts, and cloaks: gray for the woman, red for the girl. The woman—Madame Mariel, the Barrow healer—stood in the middle of the shop and squinted at Oscar. The girl, who was made of vines of curly black hair and darting eyes, was her apprentice, Callie. Callie was a couple years older than Oscar and never seemed to speak much. Though even Caleb did not speak much around Madame Mariel.

  Madame Mariel cleared her throat and looked around the room. “Where is everyone?”

  Oscar froze. She seemed to be asking him. His eyes darted to Mariel’s left boot. “Um,” he began carefully, “Master Caleb had to go to the continent, and Wolf had very important business deep in the forest with Master Robin’s new apprentice, and everyone else . . . is somewhere else.”

  He winced. He could feel Madame Mariel’s eyes on him.

  “What are you doing here? Who are you?”

  “I am minding the shop today,” he said, keeping his eyes on her left boot. “I am Oscar.”

  “Oh,” Madame Mariel said, “you’re that odd little hand Caleb has.” Oscar blinked and dared a glance up as high as Madame Mariel’s stomach. Why did she ask who he was if she already knew?

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw Callie, who was standing right behind the healer, raise her eyebrows at him. It probably meant something. It would’ve been nice to know what.

  For the last five years, most of Oscar’s non-cat interactions had been with Master Caleb and Wolf. And so he had learned them, learned the ways their faces moved around, learned how their voices rose and fell, thickened and thinned, learned the way their bodies spoke. But when he went out into the marketplace and tried to apply what he’d learned to other people, their faces all moved in different ways and their voices did all different things, their bodies were all over the place, and nothing meant anything from one person to the next. They said words they did not mean, and their conversations seemed to follow all kinds of rules—rules that no one had ever explained to Oscar. And if that weren’t enough, people talked in other ways, too, ways that had nothing to do with the things coming out of their mouths.